General Comments on 1 Nephi 16-18 Chapters 16-18 form a traveling narrative wherein the families of Lehi and Ishmael travel to the New World. The first several verses of ch. 16 take care of narratorial matters to keep chronology, then the account switches entirely to deal with the traveling and focuses squarely on four conflicts during their journey. All four of these conflicts are a result of rebellion and unfaithfulness, and all four (e.g., broken bow in 16:13-32, Ishmael's death and resulting conspiracy in 16:33-39, rebellion incited by shipbuilding 17:17-55, rebellion on the high seas in 18:9-22) are resolved as a result of divine intervention. One thing to note in this narrative is that whereas the preceding chapters were quite detailed as to chronology and specific events, these chapters gloss over years at a time and focus very specifically on just a few events. As such, we have to consider Nephi's intent on excluding and including material. In the preceding chapters Nephi has a vision explaining why it is so important for him and his entire family to get across to the New World, so a remnant of Israel might be preserved and ultimately come into contact with Gentiles. As such, this rather small group of two families is to form the core set of participants in one of the Lord's very big plans. The Lord has a great deal at stake here in making sure this group makes it across. As such, we see the Lord having to step in at crucial times to keep things on His course, otherwise the big plan of His will fall through as a result of the faithlessness of some in the group. This explains Nephi's deliberate inclusion and exclusion of material in these chapters. Nephi includes those events wherein the Lord must intervene and omits the more arduous and mundane matters where the Lord's is not directly involved. Also, Nephi's emphasis on the rebellions by the unfaithful may be intended to explain why they took so long, some 7 years, to travel to Bountiful, a trip that should have taken only months. In the ancient Exodus, the wandering in the wilderness was lengthened to 40 yeas as a result of the rebellion surrounding entering the Promised Land. Given the other numerous parallels Nephi draws between the ancient and present exodus, it is not unreasonable to conclude it is Nephi's intent here as well. Comments on 1 Nephi 16 v1-5 These verses are more closely associated with the preceding chapter 15. Nephi's brothers are stung with what he has said to them and complain against him (v. 1). Nephi admits his words are hard against those who are wicked because the wicked cannot withstand the truth of their situation (v. 2). Had they been faithful to the Lord, then his words would have lifted them rather than caused them to murmur (v. 3), and so Nephi encourages them to repent and be faithful to the Lord (v. 4). His brothers do humble themselves for a time, so much so that Nephi has hopes of them making a permanent change for the better (v. 5). v6-8 cover same basic narratorial material informing us the group is still a base camp outside of Jerusalem (v. 6). The sons of Lehi pair up and marry the daughters of Ishmael (v. 7), and thus all of the commands of the Lord had so far been fulfilled (v. 8). v8 puts the group into waiting mode, although that wait appears to have been relatively short. Since they have fled Jerusalem, obtained the plates, and received wives as commanded, they are now waiting to be told where to go and what to do. This sets the stage for v. 9. "I, Nephi, had been blessed of the Lord exceedingly", Nephi is probably commenting upon having obtained a good wife as he mentions in the preceding verse, given the considerable emphasis placed upon marriage in the Semitic culture, as well as the various revelations of the preceding chapter. v9-12 Having done everything commanded to date, the traveling party is now ready for additional instruction. Lehi, the patriarch, receives a vision by night instructing him to depart into the wilderness the next day (v. 9). When he wakes up in morning there is an odd device outside his tent door, a round brass ball which has two spindles in it, one of which tells them which direction to travel (v. 10). Now with a command to depart and a direction to travel, they strike camp and move out (v. 11- 12). Note the relatively ambiguous directions given to Lehi with no duration of travel given. The journey ends up taking some 7 years and no specific route is laid out to them. I really have to wonder if they knew how long it would take them if the less faithful parts of the party would have gone along with it. v11 "all the remainder of our provisions", this suggests they had spent some time, probably at least a few months, at the base camp by the river Lemuel. It also sets the stage for the next major story of their having to hunt to obtain sufficient food. They were running low on packed provisions. The phrase "that the Lord had given us" suggests there was something in addition to what they packed. I wouldn't include the Liahona, plates, or sword of Laban in with this as the provisions Nephi is referring to are characterized as expendable since some were remaining. I would assume Nephi was referring to water from the river Lemuel and perhaps anything edible from that campsite such as dates, figs, and small game, cp. 17:4. v12 "we did take our tents", this suggests very strongly that the party were traveling on camels. The contemporary tents employed were nothing like our present lightweight backpacking tents. They were very large, cumbersome, and heavy, requiring pack animals to carry them. v13-32 The party travels on the wilderness and pause at a place called Shazer in order to restock their food supplies (v. 13). They do so, return to camp, and then resume the journey keeping along the Red Sea in the more fertile areas (v. 14). They continue on for some time in this manner traveling with pauses for hunting forays (v. 15) following the direction on the curious ball (v. 16). However, on one of the hunting trips (v. 17), Nephi's bow, the most powerful among the hunters, breaks resulting in them obtaining no game. Nephi's brothers are angry with him over it (v. 18), and they are forced to return to camp empty handed to face their hungry families (v. 19). Upon returning to camp, Nephi's brothers and the sons of Ishmael take to complaining and drag the rest of the group down with it, so much so that even Lehi complains against the Lord for the seeming lapse in providence (v. 20). Nephi becomes the object of derision because of the loss of his bow (v. 21) and he ends up turning on his brothers and censuring them for their complaining against the Lord (v. 22). His being the scapegoat for their problems motivates him to make a new bow and arrow and take his sling and stones to fix the problem. Rather then censuring his father, as he did his brothers, he approaches his father, who possesses the curios ball and asks him where he should go to find food (v. 23). With the acrimony in the camp having subsided with Nephi's admonitions, his father goes and inquires of the Lord (v. 24) and ends up getting chastised sorely (v. 25). The Lord instructs Lehi to take a closer look at the brass ball to see what is written on it (v. 26). When Lehi and the others read what is written upon it they are filled with the fear of God (v. 27). Nephi realizes the pointers in the brass ball operate based upon the faith and diligence with which they are used (v. 28). The writing upon the brass ball is changed from time to time, according to the how closely people adhere to its admonitions, in order to educate them according to the will of the Lord (v. 29). The brass ball gives Nephi directions where he will find food (v. 30), so he follows them and obtains food (v. 31), resulting in the camp humbling itself before the Lord and giving thanks to Him (v. 32). v13 "Shazer", a transliteration to English. As indicated in the footnotes of the 1981 edition BofM, the similar Hebrew term translates to "twisting" or "intertwining", which might be referring to the geography of a river valley. The similar Arabic term would translated to "clump of trees". v18 In v. 15 we are informed the party is using bows and slings to obtain food. Verse 21 informs us the other bows had lost their spring, but what about their slings? While using bows was probably a much more efficient means of obtaining game, using slings was a real possibility. Verse 21 also says "it began to be exceedingly difficult", which I would assume to be referring to the use of slings. A group of hunters who had come to rely on archery as a means of hunting would be less proficient with a sling and stones. So, when the bows are all useless, they are left to hunt with a weapon they are not proficient in. And if morale is bad, as it was, they would sooner resort to laying blame than seriously practicing with a sling. What has happened here is that all of the other bows had been worn out by the hunting except Nephi's bows, which was augmented by metal. As such, he became the big provider, with the others providing little or nothing. So, when Nephi's bow breaks the entire hunting foray becomes a complete failure because they no longer have a viable means of obtaining game. "bow...made of fine steel", as mentioned in previous comments on 4:9 the "steel" might have actually been bronze. Regardless of what metal was used, the bow was certainly not solid metal. The most powerful ancient bows, save the English Longbow, were typically made of composite materials where layers of different materials were sandwiched together. In this case, Nephi's bow apparently had some metal sandwiched in between the wood, perhaps with bone as well as that was a common material for composite bows. v22 Note Nephi censures his brothers, but not his father or the sons of Ishmael, displaying the typical regard for Semitic family order. Rather, he indirectly encourages his father to repent of his complaining by asking him to seek revelation from the Lord in v. 23. It is the Lord who chastens Lehi in v. 25. v27 The verse says there are things written upon the brass ball that strike fear into the hearts of those who read it. However, it doesn't tell what was written on it. I would assume the gist of what was written is contained in v. 28-29. If this is the case then the fear the people have is that of being lost in the wilderness with no compass to direct them. If the second spindle points in the direction of food (see v. 30) then the complaining against the Lord would have been particularly ironic. There they were complaining the Lord had failed to provide for them when there was the curious brass ball pointing at where food was located, only they were too hard- hearted to pay attention to it. v30 The direction Nephi should travel to find food is somehow given on the brass ball. One of the spindles is said to give the direction which they should travel in v. 10. Here, we probably have the purpose of the second spindle, to give the direction of food. See my comments in the article below on the purpose of the second spindle. v33-39 The party resumes their journey, travels for some time, and then pauses to rest (v. 33). While camped, Ishmael dies and the location is called "Nahom" in token of the mourning of his daughters over his death (v. 34). The mourning apparently goes beyond the ritual associated with death as they complain over their present conditions and feel that death will overtake them as well (v. 35). This causes them to complain against Lehi and Nephi and desire to get out of the desert and back to Jerusalem (v. 36). Laman takes advantage of this change in loyalties to incite rebellion against Lehi and Nephi and argue in favor of their murder with Lemuel and the sons of Ishmael. He projects his own desires for rulership onto Nephi and faults him for it (v. 37). Laman then rationalizes Nephi has deceived them by cunning tricks and lying about revelations from angels (v. 38). However, the voice of the Lord comes to them and chastens them exceedingly, putting an end to their plans of overthrow. They again temporarily humble themselves and the Lord provides them with food so they do not perish (v. 39). v35 It appears Ishmael's death was not a result of old age. He dies while they are resting, suggesting they rested because he was unwell. The daughter's mourning includes complaints about their own afflictions and present condition saying "we must perish in the wilderness with hunger". Then in v. 39 Nephi says "the Lord did bless us again with food, that we did not perish". This makes it plain the primary fear is death from starvation or malnutrition induced illness. If Ishmael's death was not from old age, this would explain the connection with the subsequent complaints as they would fear their own seemingly imminent demise. v37-38 Nephi's recounting of Laman's persuasive speech is aimed almost entirely at the argument against himself, with less than half of the first sentence aimed at Lehi. As such, Laman's line of argumentation is probably not fully developed by Nephi in his recounting. For Laman to simply burst out that they ought to kill Lehi without some preceding rationalization seems unreasonable given the lengthy rationalization given for killing Nephi as well. I would therefore conclude the implicit argument against Lehi is given in v. 35 when the daughters of Ishmael "did murmur against my father". By context, this murmuring would be along the lines of them saying Lehi is guilty of Ishmael's death by dragging him out into the desert, and is guilty of endangering the entire party by subjecting them to death by starvation. Laman takes advantage of their already present anger against Lehi and attempts to make Nephi guilty by association because he went along with Lehi's plans in order to promote himself. Thus, both Lehi and Nephi are guilty of Ishmael's death and of jeopardizing the lives of the rest of them, so the rest of them ought to punish them for it. v38 "that he may deceive our eyes", what Laman cannot see he says never happened and what he does see is a deceptive trick by a conjurer. In other words, Laman only believes what he wants to believe, cp. 3 Ne. 2:1-2. I would assume Laman is referring to the events of 3:29 with this phrase. v39 One would assume this collusion occurred secretly so Lehi and Nephi would be unaware of the plans. As such, if the plan was to kill Lehi and Nephi by stealth, the Lord had to step in and put a stop to it immediately so as to eliminate any risk of injury to any parties. Had the Lord just warned Nephi there may have still been bloodshed in the ensuing conflict. 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